


PrereQuisite and Presumption

by lori (zakhad)



Series: Captain and Counselor [52]
Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-03
Updated: 2015-07-03
Packaged: 2018-04-07 10:34:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4260066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zakhad/pseuds/lori
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yves has an Academy assignment that needs divine intervention -- or, at least, it gets intervention whether it needs it or not.</p>
            </blockquote>





	PrereQuisite and Presumption

**Author's Note:**

> I somehow missed posting this when I added the series to AO3. So here it is.

PrereQuisite and Presumption

 

love is a place  
& through this place of  
love move  
(with brightness of peace)  
all places

yes is a world  
& in this world of  
yes live  
(skilfully curled)  
all worlds

 

\- e e cummings

~^~^~^~^~

"I'm going to flunk my ethics class."

It wasn't the answer his father expected to the routine query of how he was doing in his classes. Most of Papa's attention had been on the rack in front of him; they were in the winery, in the storage area where bottled wines were kept until sold or consumed. Papa turned from the floor-to-ceiling selection of chardonnay and burgundy to eye Yves, crossing his arms.

"You're planning to do this because?"

"I didn't plan it. I won't write the paper, and it's half the grade."

Papa's sigh of forbearance didn't help. "Why not write it? You've had no trouble with papers to this point."

"The professor assigned topics. Mine is supposed to be on fraternization between officers."

Papa snorted and turned to select a bottle. "Perhaps he knew you would have an interesting perspective on the subject."

"He didn't. I told him I couldn't write it because there weren't enough resources, and he said I could write a hundred pages on Admiral Picard and Captain Troi alone. And then he looked at me funny and asked if I was related to you somehow. I told him you were my parents, and that only made it worse -- now he wants me to interview the two of you as well as review all the articles and papers, then make a presentation to the class. Not to mention he hinted that I might persuade you to come talk to the class." Yves reached for a bottle of chardonnay and passed it to Papa as he returned the one he'd been looking over.

"I wouldn't have nearly as much useful input as your mother," Papa said. He headed for the end of the rack with Yves' choice in hand.

"I told him that neither one of you would want to come. That plenty of people have pried into your lives already and I won't be one of them."

"And he said?"

"That I'd fail the class and he'd see me next semester, because he won't give me another topic. He assigned topics randomly using an algorithm and he sees no reason to alter the order of things by having me switch with someone."

Yves followed his father from the winery and across the open area between it and the yard. His mother sat on the porch swing with a few padds and a tall glass of ebi'lan, as she usually did when grading homework or composing lectures. When Papa stopped to show her the bottle, she set aside a padd and peered at the label.

"That looks fine. What's going on?" She always sensed things before anyone spoke. It made honesty the best policy, which in turn frequently made things difficult.

"Yves is determined to fail his ethics class. His instructor wants him to write about us." Papa turned about and Maman snatched padds out of his way as he sat.

"This would be Captain Herring, wouldn't it?" Maman wrinkled her nose. "He's not one of the better instructors, from what little I've seen of the man. He's never been in space, either, and he's quite bitter about it."

"Maybe I should write about bitter grounders who never achieved anything and how their attitude affects students who are getting good marks otherwise."

Papa smiled, but Maman eyed him with the faint disapproval that warned him of further scowling if he didn't stop joking about a serious matter. "Perhaps you should complete the assignment you were given."

"But he wants me to interview you," Yves exclaimed, certain this would end the matter.

"If that's what is necessary."

"But he wants me to write about how you got around regulations and fraternized with a commanding officer without being court-martialed or dishonorably discharged. And do a presentation in class."

Maman's eyes clouded with doubt. "But you do need to complete the assignment."

"I could interview Tom and Beverly, I guess. But it's not the same -- now Captain Herring will expect me to focus on you, because you were first officer. The consequences of the captain and the first officer indulging in fraternization -- "

"We'll talk about this after dinner. Would you please go find me some flowers for the table, Yves?"

"All right." Yves jogged down the steps and across the yard to where the roses were starting to bloom. He knew his parents were talking about his assignment quite seriously; he could sense their irritation and alarm. They didn't like it any more than he did. While he carefully picked enough blooms to fill his mother's favorite vase, he formulated a plan.

Preparations for dinner took very little time, since they were replicating the food. There weren't many to prepare for, either; the twins were on Betazed with Grandmother, and Amy had gone skiing with friends from school. While he set the table and Maman centered the vase of roses on it, he explained. "I'm going to the dean's office Monday and explaining the situation. They can't make me violate my own family's privacy. If the dean doesn't see that, I'll find another way to make them listen."

Maman turned to meet his eyes. It distressed her, and Papa reacted by hesitating in decanting the wine. "After dinner," he said, resuming the pouring of a third glass.

Yves crossed the tile floor and lifted two glasses. "There's no need. I've decided."

"I see." Papa put the wine bottle on the counter and stuffed the cork in, then picked up the third glass. "You won't consider simply writing the paper using references?"

"I asked around. No one's ever heard of someone being forced to write about their family this way -- there's plenty of cadets who're second or third or fourth generation 'fleet. I searched the databases of submitted papers, too. I'm being asked to write a paper that might even incriminate you, if I can't word things properly. I won't risk seeing you questioned any further about this."

Papa smiled, and though his pride and indulgence were obvious, he shook his head. "You'll do the assignment."

"As an officer, you will be expected to carry out orders that are unpleasant and sometimes seem to violate ethics or moral obligation." Maman came up behind him and took his arm. She'd been shorter than him for a while now, but it was more obvious when she stood with him, shoulder to shoulder. "That's probably why Herring is insisting."

"How many times have you stood up to orders that you didn't think were right?"

Maman sidestepped away from him, catching his hand in hers gently, careful not to tip the glass balanced in his fingers. Her jaw set, she eyed him with a commanding officer's demeanor. "You're a cadet. You have a long way to go before you develop the ability to make decisions like that about orders."

"Then I'll start developing them now. It isn't right, and it's not fair that I'm the only one in the class being forced to stand up in front of the whole class and telling them exactly how my parents defied regulations." At the dire looks from both parents, Yves amended, "Okay, 'defied' isn't the right word. But it's what they're going to take away from it. The professor's already lectured on this, and it's exactly his opinion of the whole fraternization issue -- anyone who attempts it is clearly in the wrong. I'm either going to sound like I'm arguing with him and completely biased, or like I disapprove of my own parents' decisions."

Papa set aside his wine. "There's a middle ground between those options. Objectivity would seem a good alternative. There are ways to avoid personalizing the issue. Perhaps that is what your instructor is really wanting from you -- an objective assessment."

"Are you afraid of developing an opinion we won't like, Yves?" Maman asked. She took the glasses he was holding and went to the table.

"Our agreement with what you have to say isn't necessary." Papa had lost all his amusement and crossed his arms. "Your opinion should be yours, not ours. Perhaps this is a wiser choice of assignment than you thought. Challenging a natural bias you may have developed will help you decide for yourself how best to form relationships of your own."

"What we chose to do won't work for everyone," Maman added, giving the vase a twist and leaning to smell a rose. "Some of those resources you haven't looked at yet will tell you that others have tried and failed to maintain dual relationships while in command."

Yves watched them put out bread, napkins, and the main dish, stunned to silence. Finally, as he joined them at the table, he said, "I don't believe you want me to do this."

"The topic you were given was ethical ramifications of fraternization between officers, I believe. Not an expose of your parents' lives." Papa dropped his napkin in his lap. "Write on the topic assigned, and use the resources you find appropriate. Interviews and class visitations weren't part of the original assignment and no one else is doing them, are they? Stick to the rules. Negotiate for extra credit for anything more. And you needn't worry for my sake. I've done class visits before -- a certain instructor makes a habit of dragging me in at least once a semester to talk about Borg psychology, such as it is." He glanced at Maman, who only smiled and reached for the bread.

"You really think I should talk about you in front of nearly a hundred cadets."

Maman rolled her eyes. "If rumors and misinformation were so damaging to us, we'd have been out of Starfleet years ago. Be objective and focus on the topic, not the people. Because you're not really thinking about this assignment -- you're feeling about it. We aren't necessarily happy that we're going to be mentioned in the paper, that's true, but we weren't happy about any of the questions asked by admirals and fellow officers, either. We can survive discomfort, Yves. The question at hand is whether you can."

He wanted to answer that, but knew he couldn't. As usual, Maman had analyzed the situation and pinned down his real problem. As usual, he could only agree -- they had always endured scrutiny, and now they had decided it wasn't a problem to be included in his paper. It was his own discomfort that remained an obstacle.

~^~^~^~^~

Nights at the chateau were quieter than Yves was used to, and he found it difficult to sleep on Fridays. By Sunday night he would be back in the dormitory, missing the quiet. He lay in his bed, window open to night breezes and all the earthy smells they brought -- trees, moist soil of the vineyards as the drip lines did their duty, flowers, and when the wind turned, the stronger odor of the winery.

The moon rose high, and though it wasn't visible from where he was, he could see the light in the leaves of an oak. It was cool enough to be comfortable, warm enough to throw off covers and sleep only with the sheet. He lowered his mental defenses enough to know that his parents were asleep; he could relax now and try to sleep as well. Never assume they were too tired to do more than fall in bed, he had told his younger siblings while trying to help them develop the ability to block out their parents. It was still good advice, he thought.

Yves was drifting in the margins of wakefulness and sleep when he sensed someone near. Someone familiar, but rarely present, and definitely alien. He opened his eyes to find Q seated on the chest near the window.

"Hello," he murmured. "What do you want?"

When Q stood and moved closer, Yves realized it wasn't the Q he thought it was, but his son. It was more difficult to sense one Q as different than another; their emotions didn't come through clearly, either. Maman had compared it to reading through tissue paper.

"I've been waiting for them to sleep before I came to see you. Your father doesn't like me."

"Neither of them do. I could tell you why, but you probably already know. I didn't sense you waiting."

"I wasn't going to take physical form -- your mother would detect me. She's more sensitive than you. But I was able to hear that you're having a difficulty I might be able to help you with."

"It's been years since the last time I saw you. Why now?"

Q shrugged. "Time runs differently for us. I waited for you to be somewhere other than the Academy, since we won't be interrupted here. I just wanted to talk."

"Talk, I can do. I can't accept your help."

"My father said you would say that." He sat on the edge of the bed, was briefly surprised by the sagging of the mattress, then refocused. "I won't do anything that will change anything. But I can help you see what fraternizing -- "

Yves sat up, flinging aside the sheet, and Q jumped up in surprise. "No."

"It has been a while, hasn't it? You're much taller than I remember." Q put his hands behind his back. In the indirect moonlight, he didn't appear any different to Yves. "I can take you back through time as an invisible, undetectable observer -- "

"I said no. Was there anything else?"

"You take after your father."

"Thanks."

Q shook his head slowly. "That wasn't meant -- never mind. What if I showed you what might have happened? Would that be of use?"

Yves hesitated. Seeing a might-have-been could inform him considerably on what sorts of questions he needed to answer, saving him hours of reading and hunting for valid resources -- he could pursue his topic with more focus and less pointless searching. "What do you mean?"

"You've heard of parallel universes, haven't you?"

"We've looked at some of the theories in a few of my classes. I've also heard Worf's stories about the time he was caught in a few of them. It seems to me, from the accounts I've read and heard, that most of the time the person experiencing the anomaly sees bits of other universes directly related to him or her."

"We don't have to do that. I can take you into a parallel universe where your parents have quite a different experience with fraternizing."

"Why not just tell me about it instead of taking me there?"

Q sighed. "Because I don't know anything about it. Hasn't anyone ever told you the difference between omnipotent and omniscient? If I go and take notes for you, I won't know what to look for, either, before you suggest it."

"I can't be gone long enough for it to do me any good."

"I can have you back here five minutes from now. You won't even lose sleep."

"I thought you wanted to talk."

Q stepped closer again, arms crossed, and now Yves could see his smile. "This will be much more interesting."

Not terribly flattering, but typically Q. Yves reached for the pants he'd flung over the end of the bed. "If you've never been there, how do you know this universe exists?"

"Because all realities exist somewhere. You just can't comprehend them the same way I can."

"I don't want to see anything involving nudity or personal stuff. I'm writing about the consequences of fraternization on the professional relationship. Got it?"

"Oh, really." Q tsked at him, sounding like his father, as Yves pulled up his pants. "Suddenly it's a lot less interesting."

~^~^~^~^~

Yves found himself, on the first blink, in the corner of a conference room. Q stood with him, also wearing nothing but a pair of pants, which was consistent with the usual Q habit of adopting modes of dress of the person they were visiting. Yves wondered if there were a manual dictating dress codes for Q field work.

"No one knows we're here, don't worry." Q nodded at the people involved in a heated discussion, all of whom wore old-style uniforms, most of whom Yves recognized. deLio, seated at the head of the table, said nothing. Dr. Mengis appeared to be arguing with a blond lieutenant-commander and Geordi LaForge. The doctor and engineer were visibly younger than Yves remembered them being.

"You can't be serious," Mengis exclaimed. "The captain would never -- "

"I saw them."

"Come on, Ward," Geordi said. "This is Captain Picard we're talking about. I've seen only a couple of women turn his head, and they're not around -- there's never been anyone aboard for more than a few months who's been -- "

The door opening curtailed the conversation and everyone sat back in their chairs. The captain himself arrived. He eyed the group, gave his uniform a sharp tug, and went to the other end of the table. "Good morning." He stopped in front of Yves, causing him a moment of panic, but then reached through between Yves and Q as he asked for coffee, and Yves realized they were in front of the replicator.

"Good going," he muttered as the captain, looking younger than Yves remembered, turned away with his coffee. Q said nothing.

The meeting turned out to be routine, staff reporting for their departments. Yves sensed all kinds of tension in the room, not the least of which was the captain's, and he had to remind himself that this Captain Picard was not his father. Not yet, anyway. The door opened once more and Data arrived, closely followed by the woman who was not yet Yves' mother, Deanna Troi in the blue-trimmed uniform that indicated she was still counselor. Her eyes went straight to the captain and flitted away again, but the pathos in her face remained there for anyone to see. Yves hurt with her for whatever reason she was suffering.

"My apologies for our lateness, Captain," Data was saying. He took a chair between the doctor and the captain.

"Dr. Mengis was just giving his report. You can review it later. Was there some urgent matter, or were you simply too busy?" An edge to the captain's voice hinted at what lay beneath; Yves knew the captain was angrier than he displayed.

"I was discussing something with the counselor. I am concerned about the chain of command aboard this ship."

"Really." The flat reply neither encouraged or discouraged, it merely was.

"It has come to my attention that my fellow senior officers are finding fault with your decisions in a less constructive fashion than usual. I inquired of the counselor whether she knew of this and asked for her input into what I should do about it. She suggested an open dialogue in the context of a staff meeting."

"I see." The captain's stony expression didn't falter as he looked down the table at her. "Perhaps you would like to begin, Counselor?"

"The rumor of your assignation with me has been spreading," she said -- apparently an unexpected confession, as Data's head jerked to the right in rapt and sudden attention. She remained calm and continued. "I suspect that may have some influence on their opinions. Perhaps they feel that since you are keeping a secret, they are not trusted, and -- "

"My personal life is just that -- personal," the captain snapped. "It has nothing to do with the trust I have in my officers, which has not changed."

Yves sorted out the interplay of emotion in the pause that followed. She was angry with a sense of self-righteousness, he was angry and feeling betrayed -- they had been arguing elsewhere about whether or not to tell the crew what was going on, perhaps, and the crew was detecting signs of their relationship and gossiping about it. One of the articles Yves had read mentioned that being open about a relationship such as this was a wiser choice than an attempt to conceal it, because on any ship, hints of a relationship would be noticed and gossiped about anyway. Better to demonstrate honesty and absence of shame than pretending the relationship wasn't happening. This was a perfect example; the other officers present were not surprised, though a couple of them were disgusted. By the continued denial, perhaps? These same people had, in Yves' memory of what he'd been told, supported the captain and counselor.

"That may be your opinion, Captain," the counselor replied at last. "However, if you will but look at the faces of those around you, I think you may find that secrecy has its price. Your assumptions are not necessarily correct."

"Whatever problem there may be at the moment, it will cease to exist shortly."

She inhaled, straightened slightly, then turned her chair and left it. "I can guarantee it," she exclaimed, her three strides to the door swift and sure. Her pain and fury nearly clouded Yves' empathy to the point of saturation; it took a few moments for him to recover.

The captain remained seated, furious and so tightly controlled that his posture had gone rigid. "Mr. LaForge?"

It took a moment for the engineer to remember this was a staff meeting. He stammered an apology and began a faltering report of engine efficiency and staffing concerns.

"All right," Yves said, turning to Q. "That was informative -- don't keep your relationship a secret or you'll turn staff meetings into personal battlegrounds. I don't see how this circumstance will have anything else I can use."

"Who said this was the only one we were visiting?" Q grinned and snapped his fingers.

"Wow," Yves said, staggering against Q. The venue change had taken them into a dark room, and as his eyes adjusted he realized this was a bedroom. "Q, what did I tell you -- "

"I know, I know. Trust me."

Someone under the covers of the bed sighed and the blankets shifted. Then, softly, voice roughened by sleep, a familiar voice asked, "What's wrong?" Yves could make out hair on the pillow. His mother's hair, his father's voice.

"I'm not going over there," he told Q, who had taken a step toward them. "I'll stand right here." He was in front of the dresser mirror, which did not show his reflection.

"Dee?" A hand caressed the hair, then the blankets moved and both of them were propped on elbows, facing each other, and her hair tumbled around her shoulders in disarray. The rumpled, sleepy look of both of them was wholly unfamiliar to Yves, who hadn't made a habit of visiting their bedroom since he was five.

"I can't sleep," she mumbled.

"Worried about tomorrow," the captain replied, settling on his back but raising a hand to idly twine her curls around his fingers. Yves turned away, the sense of privacy violation tight in his chest.

"I should never have come to you," she exclaims suddenly, the rush of emotion charging the air with tension. "I should have left the ship -- "

"Deanna," he exclaimed, his tone harder than Yves remembered it ever being with her. His parents were not these people, he reminded himself, though that was difficult when they sounded exactly like them. "Stop this."

The covers hissed and there was a quiet slapping sound. Had she hit him? "Don't touch me. You're ordering me around again."

"You don't make it easy. Deanna," he tried again, more softly, "you can't undo this. I don't want to, either. I would rather be with you than -- "

"I told you, I don't want to be the reason you end your career." Her voice roughened and throbbed with agony.

"Cherie, please, don't do this." The soft plea sounded wrong to Yves; in the brief silence he figured it out. The endearment was wrong. His father called her cygne, or by name.

"I wasn't the one who wanted to tell Admiral Keller."

"He wasn't the one who initiated the court-martial."

"But he told Admiral St. John, and he asked someone else, and suddenly we're recalled to Earth. And now I have a summons to appear before the licensing board."

"What?" Incredulous, he sat up again, from the sound of it. Yves closed his eyes and crossed his arms. At his side, Q sighed.

"I'm going to lose my license, Jean-Luc. You're going to lose your ship, and I'll lose my counseling career."

"It doesn't matter," he insisted.

"Doesn't matter?" The fury in her voice actually frightened Yves. He'd never heard his mother sound so angry. "How dare you assume that it doesn't matter! You can go back to your winery, you've had offers in the private sector, but I have nothing! Once my license is gone so will my Starfleet career, and any hope of a civilian career."

The silence, to Yves, was horrible. The two of them filled the room with their pain, and he couldn't think. The bond he knew his parents shared wasn't present. He found himself gripping Q's arm, and then standing in a different place, somewhere bright and open with no walls.

"Sorry," Q said. "But you looked like you were having trouble."

"Next universe," Yves said. "Something happier?"

The open area brightened slightly, then morphed into the front porch of his father's house. The roses weren't blooming and the grass had yellowed. Yves nearly pointed out this wasn't a professional environment when the front door swung open. Slowly, one foot at a time, his father stepped out, let the door swing shut behind him, and stretched expansively. This was an older Jean-Luc Picard than Yves had ever seen; age had drawn deeper wrinkles in his face and turned his strong, straight body into a thin, fragile bow. His clothes were clean but wrinkled, his sparse tufts of hair carefully combed down.

He stepped to the top of the stairs. Yves sensed anticipation. Excitement peaked when someone came around the end of the row of trees at the far end of the yard. The visitor walked across the yard with more energy than Picard showed, but as she came closer Yves saw that her hair had gone silver with strands of black. She wore a soft tan dress with half-sleeves

Picard haltingly descended from the porch to meet her. "Deanna," he exclaimed, and it was hard to tell whether he was hoarse with feeling or age.

She smiled, her face lighting up, but Yves could see in her eyes the confusion of emotions he could so easily sense -- excitement, anxiety, affection, and regret. "Jean-Luc. Thank you for inviting me."

"Thank you for coming so far." He took her hands and leaned in to kiss her cheek. She reacted with shy acceptance, somewhat pleased yet reluctant to respond in kind. Not a couple, Yves thought gloomily.

"It's not so far. I've been meaning to visit Earth for some time anyway. What a lovely house," she said wonderingly, looking up.

"Come in, I was about to make tea."

She waited as he climbed steps, let him open the door for her, and watched his movements with a sense of shock and alarm that made Yves think she hadn't seen him in years. Q led Yves through the wall and they followed the pair to the kitchen, which looked dilapidated and desperately tidied.

"I hope you don't mind herbal tea," he said, reaching for a tin from a row of them along the wall beneath a cupboard. "It's all I have these days."

She stood in the middle of the room looking at her surroundings, her sorrow plain to see. When she made no response he paused in scooping tea leaves and looked at her, then put down the scoop and tin. She didn't seem to notice his approach; she was staring at the dining room area, probably without really seeing it, when he touched her arm.

"Anything I can do to help?"

She worked hard to not cry. Arms crossed, she looked at the floor. "I didn't mean to -- I thought it would be different, that enough time passed -- I appreciate the effort you've made to stay in contact, Jean-Luc."

"Guilt is the last thing -- "

"It isn't guilt," she blurted, turning and catching his hand. "Not the sort you think. I didn't leave because I thought it was time to advance my career. While I regret the lie, I regret more that I never told you the truth -- that I'd fallen in love with you. Because I didn't take a chance -- I never gave you the chance to make the choice yourself. I owe you an apology for that."

He gaped, staggered back a step, and straightened out of the stooped posture he'd been in. His chin trembled. "You don't," he whispered. "I should have said something -- I should have told you how I. . . but you knew, didn't you?"

Yves struggled against the combined force of their agony at lost chances, lost time, lost love, and found himself digging his fingers into Q's arm again. "Want to leave?" Q asked. Yves shook his head and watched, eyes burning. This was not happy, but it was informative.

"I knew how often you have ignored your own feelings in favor of career considerations. I knew that you had done nothing about how you felt for weeks, and that wasn't likely to change -- I knew you had chosen to say nothing. I couldn't stay any longer." Now tears were falling from her dark, glittering eyes.

"Oh," he gasped. "Oh, Deanna. I never thought -- I never dreamed you could feel the same about me. I only knew you were terribly unhappy. I thought all I could do was let you go."

They reached for each other, luminous expressions on their faces, the turmoil of emotion as they came together overwhelming Yves; he steadied himself and waited. Hoping for some further revelation of their reasoning for the decisions they had made, he endured and continued to watch.

But very little happened. For a long time, the old couple embraced. He said nothing. She seemed to be crying, still. Then she stepped back to look up into his eyes and raised a hand to his face.

"I'll make the tea," she said. He only smiled and watched her fill the teapot then place it on the stove. He got two cups and saucers, put out a plate of cookies, and took out a pint of milk while she added tea to the pot once the water boiled.

"How long can you stay?"

She crossed to the dining room table carefully with the pot and set it on the trivet, then took the chair he'd pulled out for her. "I thought I was coming for tea. I wouldn't want to impose."

"I would not ask, if you were an imposition. Perhaps I should rephrase. How long would you like to stay?"

"How long would I be welcome?"

He studied her, lips pursed in contemplation, though Yves sensed this indicated no real thought, only a desire not to appear too forward. Though it was certainly forward enough already. "You are always welcome."

She did the same, appeared contemplative and even a little flirtatious -- a certain tilt of her head, the faint smile, the slant of her eyebrow and the glint of mischief in her eyes. It was similar to a look Yves had seen his mother give his father many times, albeit less playful and overt.

"If you'll show me which room I can -- "

"Any of them," he exclaimed boldly.

Mouth open, she stared at him. "I left my luggage -- "

"I'll send one of the gardeners."

"How helpful," she said faintly, then smiled and poured herself a cup of tea. "I sense that you have a strong motive, perhaps a goal, in this determined effort to be accommodating."

He suddenly became subdued, letting his hands fall to the table, his tea untouched, his smile fading. "I cannot assume anything about your feelings, the future, or the likelihood that. . . . I cannot say that my own feelings are the same as when you left. I cannot make promises. However, I know that right now, I very much want you here, not just for tea. I would like to see what happens. I would enjoy your company -- I always have."

She met his eyes, her smile less knowing and more appreciative. "Thank you. I don't know what might happen, either. But I'd like to stay long enough to find out."

He grabbed for his cup, almost knocking it aside, and steadied himself before drinking. He couldn't seem to bring himself to look at her, and when he finally did, he put the cup down slowly and watched her.

"I've missed you, Jean-Luc." She reached out; he watched her hand as if unsure what it would do. When she laid it on his arm he covered her fingers with his own.

Yves waited, knowing that both of them had so much to say -- he could sense the tension, the impulse to speak, the pull toward each other -- but neither broke the silence. They sat together as if turned to stone.

"I should have come when you invited me," he said at last. "After the first few messages we exchanged. It shouldn't have been like this."

"I should have told you how I felt before I left the Enterprise."

"I can't stop thinking about it, but it's so useless. I have. . . so little time for self-recriminations."

She leaned closer, putting her other hand over his. "I don't want to spend our time reviewing missed opportunities. I understand, Jean-Luc."

"I don't have anything left to offer but friendship."

"Was I asking for anything else? I think you underestimate yourself," she murmured, sitting back. "And it's not as though I'm a great prize. My children view me in much the same way I viewed my mother, actually, with love and affection and considerable skepticism and disbelief. They're off to college, and I'm no longer communicating with their father, to my relief. I haven't had much time for friends. I'd like that to be different."

"I'm glad you came, Deanna," he said softly, almost wistful. "You're welcome here any time, whenever you want."

"I'd like to see the rest of the house, the winery, everything." She gestured at the walls vaguely.

"Of course."

They stood together, he started to turn, but she caught his arm gently. "What?"

"I never could fool you." He nodded, almost to himself, and turned away. "I should tell you anyway. I've left it all to you, in my will."

She couldn't conceal her shock, or the tears -- it was all too much for Yves but he shook his head fervently when Q asked again if he wanted to leave.

"There's no one else," Picard continued. "Cousins, all dispersed or dead, and I don't know their children -- other than that I have no family. Marie passed on several years ago. There's Data, I suppose, though what he would do with it I have no idea. I don't know any of them any more, really. I've become one of those eccentric old hermits I always believed I could never be. Beverly -- I can't even find Wesley." He couldn't seem to speak of Beverly without choking. "And I'd really rather that someone. . . someone who understands would have it."

"Jean-Luc," she cried, but was unable to say anything more. He faced her again. Another long silence ensued. To Yves' surprise, she spoke first.

"Have you gotten any help?"

"I have a few people working in the vineyard."

"No," she exclaimed, exasperated, "have you gotten any counseling?"

"I don't need -- " He sniffed, bowed his head, and continued. "No, I haven't. I don't want to argue about it, either. We'll start the tour with the house -- the living room."

She followed, but Yves didn't. "Q, can you tell me what happens to them?"

"Not a lot. They linger on for a while, she never makes it back to Betazed even after he dies, and the house goes to her son." Q picked up one of the cups as if he'd found an artifact to study.

"But they're happy for a while, at least."

"Not really. He's made choices and has to live with their consequences. She's here for him now, but she's also wishing she had said something -- the underlying guilt keeps them from being much more than housemates, but she stays, and they find solace in each other's company." Q studied the underside of the teapot by raising it high overhead.

"Can we go?"

"You don't seem pleased. You said something happier." Q put down the pot and crossed his arms.

"I wanted to see the impact of fraternization on their professional lives."

Q shrugged. "Doesn't this qualify? Your mother left the ship, had children, lived on Betazed until she came here, and your father retired not long after she left. That's an impact."

"But -- oh, well. I suppose I could qualify it as the impact of not fraternizing when the opportunity arose. Any others for us to see?"

"More than you probably want to know about."

~^~^~^~^~

Yves hardly wobbled when suddenly they landed on the deck, this time on the bridge. This was the tenth -- perhaps the twelfth? he was losing track -- alternate reality. The last few were dismally similar to the first one, arguments that tore the couple apart in the earliest stage of the relationship.

"This one will be unique, I think," Q said. "Look at this. Already different."

He gestured at the first officer's chair, where Worf sat. Captain Picard seemed smaller by comparison, sitting next to him.

"Just because personnel -- " The lift doors opened. Yves watched in shock as his mother -- no, bad habit, this was Counselor Troi in blue-shouldered uniform -- strolled out hand in hand with Will Riker, whose four pips were plain to see along his collar. Yves looked again at the man in the captain's chair and finally saw the admiral's bars instead of pips, and a plain black uniform with red piping at the cuffs and collar rather than the duty uniform everyone else wore.

Picard rose, standing aside gracefully and smiling at the couple. "Mr. Worf tells me we have fifteen minutes to arrival."

"We'll be sorry to see you go," Riker said, sounding quite convincing and even smiling. But Yves sensed something more -- firmly suppressed anger.

"I've enjoyed my time aboard the Titan very much. Could I speak to you a moment, Counselor?" the admiral asked. Yves stared at him, unable to disentangle the confusing, repressed knot of emotion in Picard. The admiral had a nonchalant, pleasant demeanor and seemed unaware of the hostile glance from Riker.

"Of course, Admiral." Troi kept a polite, professional smile in place and headed for the ready room. Riker's quickly-hidden hostility returned as he watched the admiral follow her, then the captain turned to Worf and asked a question about the state of the sensors.

Yves found himself following the admiral, intensely curious and yet repulsed by this situation. His legs felt heavy, as if his body registered the wrongness of his eavesdropping and the intense anxiety he felt in reaction to what he sensed from these people who seemed so familiar.

"I'll bet they're having an affair," Q said, hovering near Yves' shoulder.

"Shut up."

This was not a Sovereign-class vessel, and though the bridge seemed the same, the ready room was small and square, the replicator closer to the desk so that the admiral could sit and retrieve a beverage he requested. Troi maintained her cool facade though her feelings had shifted. Yves took a position standing near her chair, slightly behind her.

"Have you given any thought to my offer?" The admiral shoved tea across the desk toward her.

"I have always enjoyed working with you, Admiral. I've enjoyed the opportunity to help you on this mission. It's been a pleasure and a privilege to participate in a diplomatic endeavor such as this, and all the more so because we do work together well."

While she paused, the admiral's smile turned regretful. "I see."

"I'm flattered by your offer of a position on your staff," Troi continued. "I think that I would like to accept that offer, were I not certain that there is more that you are not telling me."

"If you are certain of that, I'm sure you know well enough what I cannot say." Now he lost the smile altogether and looked down at the shining black surface of the desk. "You also know why I cannot say it. I had hoped that it would be understood that I expect no acknowledgement or action to that end, but I should have realized you would wish to voice your reaction -- one of the qualities I find most admirable in you is your honesty."

"You would not overlook it, were our positions reversed," Troi said softly. "I cannot ignore your feelings any more than you could ignore a crewmember out of uniform while on duty."

He smirked, finally looking at her. "An interesting metaphor. So you are gently working your way to refusing my offer. I appreciate the intent."

"I would have accepted it four years ago." Hands folded in her lap, she fixed her eyes on the leading edge of the desk.

Silence dragged on, giving Yves time to assimilate what was happening. Her confession meant something more to both of them than could have been construed from her words; something in their shared history made this a critical moment. From the regret and sadness she felt, and the stunned realization and excitement the admiral felt, this was yet another timeline in which their timing had not meshed. The results were much more dramatic than the last few examples, however.

The admiral leaned forward slightly, thinking and shifting emotions more rapidly than Yves had ever sensed from anyone. "I hope you will contact me if. . . if circumstances were to change in such a way that you -- "

"Of course I would," she exclaimed, cutting him off and meeting his eyes with such resolute flat black eyes that the underlying message was clear. Circumstances would not change.

The admiral sipped his tea, an action Yves had seen his father take thousands of times, but unlike most other times this was a way of stalling, of not wanting to give in. "Deanna," he began, then held back the words he wanted to say.

"It isn't too late, logistically speaking. He might even forgive me in time. What I am saying is that I accept reality for what it is, and however sympathetic I may be, I recognize that sympathy is not what you or I would settle for."

Picard remained silent, though he had something to say. Yves crept up to stand next to Troi so he could look at her face. She had dropped her gaze again. Picard stared at his cup. After a long pause, he finally sighed.

"We haven't been talking about the job. I hadn't intended to address. . . ."

"I understand. I think you also understand why I could not avoid addressing it. If I had allowed you to speak only of the job opportunity, it would never have been confronted. You knew you needed closure but you didn't want it."

"And you needed to lock a door that was never opened."

As if they'd planned it, they looked at each other simultaneously, eyes meeting over the now-cold drinks. His sad expression almost matched his feelings. Yves wished he could comfort them.

"I'm sorry," the admiral said. "I should have said something. . . I should have realized you knew, four years ago."

Her smile surprised Yves. "We would have been compatible, I think. But I can't regret what has happened since. I hope that we will remain friends."

"I'm certain of that." His smile had a forced, painful quality as he rose to come around the desk and shake her hand. Then the page interrupted them. Their hands dropped to their sides, and he glanced at the door.

"Good bye, Admiral," she said, putting her hands behind her back. "Until next time."

"Counselor," he responded automatically. Then hesitated, as if considering taking a risk, but then he shook off the urge, tugged his uniform straight, and headed out the door, which slid shut behind him as he began a loud farewell to the captain.

Yves stood with Troi, who lost her semblance of cheer and drooped visibly, hugging herself and looking at the floor.

"She looks sad," Q commented, walking around her. Yves was still surprised that she didn't respond; it didn't matter how many times they did this, he still expected reaction.

"It's difficult to disappoint someone you care about."

Riker entered the room, bringing his overabundance of anxiety to flood Yves' empathy. "You all right?"

"Of course. I have to wonder what it would have been like." She uncrossed her arms and turned slightly to look up at Riker.

"What, working with him or. . . ." He gestured vaguely and, noticing the cups, went to dispose of them.

"I imagine he would have been an attentive and conscientious lover." Her matter-of-fact comment shocked Yves to immobility; he had been about to suggest moving on. Q snorted, amused and shaking his head.

Riker, too, seemed surprised. He turned from the replicator with crossed arms. "You imagine?"

"In an abstract sort of way. I know that he would never have left me."

She sounded distracted and wistful, preoccupied, and it probably didn't help that she was apparently oblivious to the way Riker's expression changed. But before he could explode, she sighed heavily and sat down with her arms crossed over her abdomen.

"I would never leave you," he said at last, somehow setting aside anger.

"That's true now, anyway," she said in the same distracted manner.

Again, anger clouded Riker's expression. "I don't think it was ever true."

"You can continue to think so, if it makes you feel better." Rising, she turned for the door. "I'm going to get Joshua out of daycare."

"I don't understand you."

She looked back, hesitating just as the door began to open. When she didn't move through, it closed again. "Perhaps."

He glared, openly showing what he felt. "Then what would you say about my understanding you?"

"You allow your preconceptions to get in the way of understanding me. You assume that because I am not dismissive to the point of disrespect, there is more to my feelings for Jean-Luc than affection and respect such as what any officer might feel for a former superior officer and friend. You assume that because I am not reassuring you now that I'm uncaring. I suggest a review of the past couple of years and some contemplation of the fact that I'm still here instead of departing with the admiral."

"You're being dismissive of me, ignoring how you know I feel," he accused sharply.

"I'm not encouraging this unwarranted fit of jealousy." She put her hands on her hips. "When you can remember that I explained what I was going to do about Jean-Luc and why, and when you can appreciate why I might want to avoid severing all ties with him, I'll be willing to talk with you about this."

She spun and strode from the room. Riker sighed, raked his fingers through his hair, scratched his beard, and sat down heavily at his desk.

"Papa wouldn't have done that," Yves said.

"Left without her?"

"No, I mean what he's doing." Yves indicated Riker, who sat with his head in his hands. "He's so emotional about what happened. He can't even see what she's doing -- she's reacting to both of them with integrity and honesty. And she tolerates it as if she's dealt with it many times before."

"So what would your father do? You think he would feel the same way?"

"I don't know. I just know he wouldn't. . . make assumptions that way. He would listen to her more than that."

"This scenario upsets you more than the other ones."

"Because of him," Yves exclaimed, pacing around the chair Troi had sat in. Riker was now sitting back in his chair, deep in thought. "He's like an uncle to me. And here he's acting -- I don't know."

"I wonder if this would be easier if you spoke to one of them. Maybe your mother?"

"She isn't my mother. None of these people are like the ones I know. Because it's a different reality, yes, but I don't see how my appearance will do anything but interfere."

"Which one would you trust to keep your presence a secret?"

Yves sighed, watching Riker tap his finger on the arm of the chair and stare at nothing. "Not him. And my mother would have difficulty keeping it from him -- I think there's some sort of bond between them."

"So that leaves one other person." Q snapped his fingers. Suddenly they were on a different ship, one in which the standard issue decor was in shades of warm browns and tans. He and Q stood in a living room of what must be guest quarters. Admiral Picard, the one who had just left Riker's vessel, sat alone on the couch, soft classical music playing. Q sat down on the next cushion over and smiled up at Yves.

"Want to talk to him?"

Yves stared at the admiral's closed eyes, the familiar face, and sensed the lingering pain. It would be wrong to interfere. Wrong to reveal himself to this man who was not and never would be his father. Empathy demanded otherwise. He wavered, undecided, and Q looked from the admiral to him. It occurred to him then that there were other considerations.

"Does he know what a Q is, in this reality?"

"I don't know. Let me check." Q vanished, without the showy flash of light, then reappeared just as alarmingly. "My father visited very few alternate realities, but this was one of them. He must have found it as interesting as we do."

Yves contemplated the admiral a few more moments, then glanced down at his bare chest. "We should go."

"If clothes are the only issue -- " Q snapped his fingers again and Yves' cadet uniform appeared on his body.

"Why are you pushing me to do this?"

"You came for information to help you understand the ethical considerations in fraternization, didn't you? This more than the others seems to be a version of your father that might be open to discussing it. He talked about it openly with the counselor -- he didn't pursue a relationship with her, but he still wanted to work with her. You might have noticed, if you weren't so caught up in your own emotional reaction to these people."

Yves nodded. "All right. But I'm still not sure I understand why you're doing this. From everything I've heard, the Q aren't prone to being helpful."

"My father wants me to learn from humans. This isn't the first time I've been sent off to be with your species."

The temptation was to ask for details about other times Q had done something like this, but Yves resisted and moved to stand in the middle of the room, hands behind his back and feet apart. "Let's do this. I think this should be the last one, though."

Q snapped his fingers, disappearing from the couch and reappearing next to Yves, and the resulting flash got the admiral's attention. Picard opened his eyes, saw them, and froze.

"I'm Yves, uh, and I was wondering if you would be willing to help me." Yves chided himself for not having taken the time for preparation. He had almost blurted out everything at once.

The admiral considered him soberly. "You would appear to be in Starfleet uniform, although not one with which I am familiar."

Q had changed into one as well, Yves realized. "I'm not from. . . I'm from an alternate universe. Q was helping me research a paper by showing me different versions of what happens between -- my paper is for ethics class, about the ramifications of fraternization upon an officer's career and whether or not one can fraternize ethically. And he thought you would be able to help."

The admiral smiled, which was wholly unexpected. "This is Q?"

"Not the one you know," Q explained. "His son."

"I see," the admiral said, still smiling. "And Yves is a friend of yours?"

"You could say our fathers have met."

All the admiral's attention shifted to Yves. He rose from the couch, stepped around the low coffee table, and studied Yves' face. "And your father would be?"

"Well, you -- another version of you. After you married. . . Counselor Troi."

The admiral's smile dwindled and his eyebrows rose. His hazel eyes traveled up, evidently taking in Yves' short black hair. He sidestepped, studying Yves carefully.

"I see," he said at last, standing back. "You are saying that, in some other universe, I married my own counselor. It must be quite a different universe -- here, there would be a considerable lack of ethics involved in such an endeavor. A counselor shouldn't marry patients -- a captain shouldn't become involved with subordinates, for similar reasons."

"I understand all those issues. I've studied them in class, as we've covered all sorts of ethics codes, including the newer ones being suggested by Command. There hasn't been an explicit ethics code that covers relationships between officers. Starfleet history is full of exceptions to rules and regulations across the board, from the Prime Directive to the marriage of my parents, and my instructor says that the few overt relationships between senior officers has brought Command's attention to the necessity of addressing things that have been covert for years already. So it's been years in the making, and they've interviewed my parents many times, and Tom and Beverly -- "

"Beverly," the admiral blurted. "Really."

"And they're on the verge of publishing this explicit ethics code. So of course, my instructor includes this as a topic he assigned randomly to the class, and it's just the way the universe works that I've ended up with it. I tried to explain to my parents that I didn't want to do it, but they say it's important for me to look objectively at the issue because it won't work for everyone the way it worked for them."

The admiral headed toward the replicator. The music, which had been soft and slow, shifted tempo and added percussion. "Computer, music off. Tea, Earl Grey, hot." He took the cup and turned to look at them. "Would you care for anything?"

"The same, thanks," Yves said. Q shook his head.

He ordered another tea, smiling as he brought it. "You know, I don't think that I can help you, Yves. I didn't pursue any of the relationships I might have had with other officers precisely because I felt it was the wrong thing to do. I wonder if your own father had any input?"

"I grew up on the Enterprise with my brother and sisters, while he was still captain and my mother was the first officer. I've seen how they work together, and there's a lot of things they have that other couples I've met don't have. I think, in a way, that Maman's empathy. . . ." Yves sensed the shock and struggled for a way to address it, opting for honesty at last. "We call her Maman. We learned French along with Standard and Betazoid. Papa felt it was only fair."

The admiral nodded stiffly. "Of course." He moved to sit down at the table, gesturing for them to come along. When they were seated, he smiled without real feeling. "You have some of your mother's abilities."

"It's limited -- I don't have her range, and it's easier to overwhelm me so I can't identify emotions. But she told me that might change, that she had more control as she got older." Yves drank tea and glanced at Q, sitting at ease and wearing a wily smile. "Oh, please. This isn't funny."

"Was I laughing?"

"You have the 'aren't humans cute' expression."

Q shrugged. "Would you prefer my bored expression?"

"You could at least pretend you're interested."

"I find all of this interesting, really. That's part of my function in the Continuum."

"So you're supposed to be interested, as opposed to being a nuisance," the admiral said. "I find that refreshing."

"My father's mistake was to indulge his sense of humor before establishing a rapport."

"We have a rapport? I must have missed that part," the admiral exclaimed, shaking his head.

"Great, we're back to this, then," Yves muttered, rolling his eyes.

"Sorry. Would it be easier if I left you two alone?" Q asked.

The admiral cleared his throat. "I'm still not certain why you believe I will be of any help to you, Yves. I don't see how you could cite this interview in your paper, unless your instructor is familiar with and actually believes in the existence of the Q Continuum."

"I'm having trouble getting it straight in my head what the issues really are," Yves replied, putting down his cup. "Maman says I'm feeling about it, not thinking about it. And coming here has made me see that's true. You were willing to work with the counselor, knowing that she knows how you feel about her, and you expected her to consider it. And Captain Riker's reaction -- "

The admiral stared at him, and he realized that it hadn't been made clear that he and Q had witnessed the entire exchange on Riker's ship. The ire clearly visible in Picard's face prickled.

"I'm sorry," Yves said softly, resorting to one of his mother's tactics. "I forgot to tell you -- I'm not good at this, I've never done this before. I don't make a habit of eavesdropping. Q and I did hear your conversation with her, just a while ago. If you want us to leave. . . ."

The softness dampened the admiral's ire, but now he frowned at the table, thinking rapidly. "It was a mutual decision not to discuss it. That she chose to do it now -- you know, you really are very much like her. Just now you sounded like her. I imagine you've watched her handle my temper for years."

"Yes, and also the way she redirected you back to the topic when you tried to avoid it by switching to side issues." It only occurred to him that this was a confrontation and not merely a comment when the admiral reacted with widened eyes.

But then the admiral laughed, leaning back in his chair, genuinely amused. He smoothed his hand over his head, and at that point Yves felt at home.

"You want me to tell you about the counselor and why I chose not to act on my feelings," he exclaimed. "And what did you believe would motivate me to do this? Have your parents been so explicit about their lives?"

Yves thought about this, and finally leaned forward, resting his forearms on the table. "My parents have never said much about how they came together. But they've always been honest about it -- they told us that much, that the main reason Starfleet never directly prohibited it was because they never hid their relationship."

The admiral studied Yves with a clear-eyed, curious yet measuring expression, as if everything he was saying was of great interest but judgment must be withheld. "Of course," he said tentatively. "Because reacting negatively would tarnish Starfleet's reputation for tolerance and respecting the private lives of officers."

"Well, I don't know if. . . . Maman told me they would have left Starfleet if they were unable to serve on the same ship."

"Your parents must care for each other a great deal."

Yves paused this time, to take stock of everything that statement didn't express. "I know they do. But their careers are very important as well. I don't think they ever chose career over family. They knew they might have to choose and prioritized family over career, but they never really had to sacrifice one over the other."

"But it wasn't easy," the admiral half-asked.

"Oh, not at all. There were injuries in the line of duty -- I remember Papa being on medical leave once for months, when I was four or five. Maman had difficulties when she was pregnant, and there were a few times she was injured, too. One of them would take care of the ship and the family while the other recuperated."

"Well. I must say, I'm impressed -- I have never been interested in children. You seem to be a responsible and conscientious young man, aside from the momentary eavesdropping. While I see you are very like your mother, it sounds like your father was just as much an influence on you. This methodical search for answers, for example -- although I'm surprised he's allowed you to associate with any of the Q."

Q snorted and straightened defensively. Yves put a hand on Q's arm. "My father doesn't know. I'm sure he would be upset if he did."

The admiral laughed again. "That would be another resemblance to your father. Rebelliousness appears to be genetic. My nephews exasperate their parents daily."

"Nephews?" The jarring re-realization that this was not his reality brought Yves back to his reason for being there. "You said you weren't interested in having children. That's a definite difference -- even though I don't think he thought about it until they were married, I've never heard anything that would indicate Papa was reluctant to have us. Do you think you would change your mind if you had married?"

"I was married too briefly to even think about it."

This was getting too far astray. "You don't believe officers should become romantically involved. Counselor Troi seemed to feel it was necessary to discuss your feelings, though. I wonder if she doubted you would be so resolute."

"I couldn't say what she thought. It wouldn't have mattered." The admiral noticed the expression on Yves' face and sighed. "Practically speaking. I do care enough not to be so callous as to discount her feelings, Yves. I meant that it would not alter or influence my actions. I admire and respect Counselor Troi as an officer."

"But feelings that you had four years ago are still present and influencing her choices. If you had been open with her four years ago -- "

"Enough!" The admiral left the table to pace restlessly. "My feelings are not the issue."

"But she sees them as an issue," Yves exclaimed. "Because they are -- you couldn't help but be influenced by them on some level. And she would never be able to feel she could work with you if she couldn't be honest and forthright, that's not her way. . . ."

The admiral didn't notice Yves' reaction to his epiphany. "I understand, she's honest, and she's always been able to sense how I've felt -- but at the same time, she's never confronted me with it until now."

"She gave you a chance," Yves exclaimed, rising from his chair. "You can't respond to her with the same level of emotion. That's what she was looking for."

"What?" Picard snapped.

"No, not level of emotion -- hehrin is the word. But you don't speak Betazoid and it doesn't translate. She would have gone with you four years ago, you could have talked her into it today. But you weren't interested in allowing the attraction, the emotions, to have any place in your life. You aren't questioning your decision to define your relationship with her -- she gave you what you would expect today, a professional stating her position in a way that matched your preferred method of interaction and yet she remained true to her feelings. Maybe she confronted you to see if you would express your feelings for her -- if you were willing to match her with. . . honest intensity is the closest I'll get to a translation, maybe she might have changed her mind. This isn't making any sense, is it?"

It was the admiral's expression more than anything Yves sensed that brought him to a halt. Once he lost his train of thought, he could sense what was going on -- the admiral had a familiar expression, the careful blank one Papa used to mask strong emotion, and underneath it was an ocean of doubt, anxiety, and anger.

"You are saying," the admiral said, brow furrowing, "that if I had openly admitted how I felt and expressed a desire for an unprofessional and inappropriate liaison with her, the counselor would have left her husband. You are suggesting that I should proposition the wife of my very good friend."

"No," Yves exclaimed. "I -- I was only theorizing, extrapolating from what I sensed from you. All three of you. But it doesn't matter, it's irrelevant, you've all made commitments and my speculation probably has more to do with my own parents than you. Because that's what I couldn't see before. I know they have a bond, that it's strong and it's endured incredible stressors over the years. I know that's possible only because of the commitment they have to each other. But seeing all these realities, one after the next, where the relationship failed or never came to be -- thank you, sir, for your forbearance and patience."

The admiral nodded stiffly. "You are welcome to it. I assume that you will be departing soon?"

Yves turned to Q. "Yes. Let's go home."

~^~^~^~^~

The most difficult part of the experience was saying nothing for the duration of the weekend and acting as though nothing had happened. His mother noted his anxiety, but said nothing, likely attributing it to his distress over the paper itself and allowing him the choice to discuss it or not.

It took a week and a half to draft the paper, and another two weeks of editing, to achieve a satisfactory fifteen pages of coherent discussion of the ethics of fraternization. He spent another week distilling the information for the presentation. Each weekend he spent with his parents, he asked a few more questions and noted their answers.

On the day of his presentation, he arrived early for class to find most of his classmates were already there. He also saw, in the two seats in the last row to the far left, his mother, standing out from the crowd in her captain's uniform and her calm, confident demeanor. This was a first-year class, part of the core prerequisites for advancement, and was therefore three seats short of its maximum capacity of fifty students. He wondered if anyone would recognize her; she taught courses for more advanced students.

Captain Herring arrived just a few minutes later. "Ready to go? You're up first."

"Yes, sir." Yves put his padd on the lectern.

Herring glanced up the tiered rows of seats. "Your mother asked if I minded if she listened in."

"I know. It's okay by me. She'll hear it all again later when I let my father hear it."

Herring cleared his throat. "Computer, amplification on, normal volume." The chirp from the lectern coincided with the lights brightening to the usual level. "Good afternoon. Today we will hear from Yves Picard, whose paper was titled 'The Ethical Implications of Fraternization.' If you will take your seats, please, and remember to be honest with your reviews."

People sat down, padds came up, and forty-eight people watched Yves. He worked through his outline in a pedestrian manner, addressing issue after issue and citing every article he'd found that concluded liaisons between officers stationed together and in the same chain of command were inadvisable and likely to create more problems than result in a stable, fulfilling relationship. He finished with his conclusion, which agreed with Captain Herring's -- the reality was that the odds were stacked against anyone attempting to maintain the chain of command effectively while fraternizing with a superior or subordinate officer.

A moment of silence followed. Then, the inevitable happened -- Herring rose from the seat on the right end of the front row and said, "A well-reasoned paper, but it doesn't account for some notable exceptions. How would you explain publicized couples such as Picard and Troi, Glendenning and Crusher, or Maine and Heinz?"

"I can't. I don't see how I could be expected to -- the only suggestion I have is to consider the odds, and the nature of the people who have beaten them. A handful of exceptions against hundreds of failed attempts. Any statistical sampling will contain such anomalies."

Herring remained standing, arms crossed. "But there is a wealth of literature extant which would have provided you with sound observations -- "

"Of my own parents, Captain. And my godparents. I was there when the psychologists visited and I saw the irritation and annoyance their evaluations caused. My parents only subjected themselves to it so that Starfleet would see they were capable of being the exception to the rule. Neither of them recommends such a relationship to anyone. I found in my research that I could not condone it, either. My paper reflects sound statistical research and I believe it conforms to the strictures of the assignment as given in the syllabus."

Herring nodded. "And you found none of the articles containing actual data on functional officer liaisons of any use in your research."

"The sample size is too limited, sir. But if you are asking me to state an opinion of those articles about my parents that I did not use, I can elaborate. I am out of time, however."

"I think it would be a useful exercise."

Yves stared at Herring's tanned, narrow face and realized that he was to be the latest in a line of students whose presentation became fodder for Herring's criticism, in the guise of instruction. He glanced up at his mother; she wore a serious expression, but he could sense her irritation.

"Yes, sir. My opinion of the articles written on the mechanisms of my parents' success in maintaining an efficacious working relationship while married is that they are all well written, well informed, theoretically sound, and explain many factors necessary to accomplish such a relationship. What is missing from all of them is, I believe, the one thing that allowed all of the various positive factors to work together to a good result. As there is no documentation of this single aspect of their relationship, I felt that the existing data was incomplete."

Yves sensed rather than saw his mother straightening in her seat. He kept his gaze on Herring, whose thin black eyebrows had climbed high on his narrow forehead. "And so you did not use it. What is this missing aspect?"

Yves searched the class until he found the dark eyes and short black hair he hoped would be there. "Cadet Stali, could you explain in Standard the definition of hehrin?"

Stali popped up from his seat. "It's a state of being. The capacity to accept another fully, regardless of differences. The ability to accept that one will never completely understand another, no matter how effective the communication, and be at peace with it. The joining of minds without subsuming either individual. A relationship of equals." He smiled, shrugging. "That begins to describe it. It's one of those terms that has a telepathic component to demonstrate as well as explain it. There's no way to convey in Standard the sense of it."

"Thank you." Yves turned back to Herring. His mother projected the sensation of a hug, which was difficult to ignore.

"You believe that a subjective Betazoid concept played a part in your parents' success," Herring summarized.

"You sound skeptical, sir. But I've lived with them all my life. I told you, they're an exception to the rule, an example of what can happen given two people coming together at the right time, at the right phase of their lives -- everything that happened before they decided it was possible prepared them well enough to make it so. I can't give you any other explanation than that."

"I see. Thank you, Cadet." He turned around and looked straight at Troi, to Yves' surprise. "Would you be willing to add to that, Captain?"

Maman came down the steps slowly, drawing even with Herring and looking him in the eye. "I would, if I weren't certain that my son had adequately covered the material."

All eyes were riveted to the pair of captains. Yves struggled against the tension level in the room, wanting to focus on what they were feeling and fending off the emotions of the other cadets.

"Do you feel his theory is correct, that this hey-reen phenomenon is a key component of your success?"

"I fail to see the relevance. You have not understood it well enough to know that it isn't a 'phenomenon' but a way of being with another person." She smiled at Yves briefly before facing the instructor again. "Would you mind excusing Yves, if he is finished with his presentation? I'd like to take him to my class to share his conclusions."

Herring nodded stiffly. "Very well. Your reviews should be finished and on your padd momentarily, Cadet Picard. You are excused. Cadet Fenley, are you prepared?"

Yves followed his mother from the room. For a while she led him through gray and white corridors, until they exited the building into a courtyard. She slowed, sidled into a grassy area, and faced him.

"Maman?"

"I'm proud of you," she exclaimed, gripping his arm. "That was a clever way of avoiding the material you didn't want to address while completing the assignment."

Yves held his breath for a moment. "Was I right?"

Maman's gleeful grin faded. "About hehrin? That's not for me to say, Yves. It's a subjective state. It's certainly not something that can be maintained for very long, and I couldn't testify to whether or not another person has ever achieved it. Where did you hear about it?"

"While we were on Betazed, when you had us in school for a term to learn the language. We learned about it in philosophy class. But it seemed to apply to you and Papa -- you really do seem to have those qualities in relation to each other."

Maman's resigned amusement didn't reassure him. "I think you're correct in thinking that your father and I do have something similar to hehrin -- I also think you have an incomplete understanding of it yourself, otherwise you might have been reticent to use it. However, it was a good way to circumvent Herring's criticisms."

"Do you really want me to give the presentation to your class?" Yves glanced down at flashing notations on his padd. The other students had given him good reviews, especially on relevance of subject matter.

"Was I lying to Herring?"

Yves shook his head. "Which class?"

"Psychology of Command. It's for command track only. I intend to forward my students' reviews to Herring as well." She reached up to smooth his hair, as she hadn't done in years. "Don't worry, petit. It's an excellent paper. Your father agrees."

"How. . . ." He sniffed as she patted her communicator. "He's supposed to be at Command."

"He is. He's been in a very important meeting since your class started." She caught his hand. "Don't be upset, Yves. He wanted to hear it first-hand."

He shook his head. "It's all right. I was just startled. Let's go."

On the way to her classroom, they passed a single cadet on a bench, which was unusual; at this time of day most cadets were in class. Yves thought he sensed something familiar about him, too. He glanced back as the path took them through a rose garden and as he did so the cadet raised his head.

"Yves?" Maman asked when he stopped.

"I'll be right back. This will only take a minute." He hurried back to Q and perched on the bench beside him. "You heard?"

"I heard. I feel unappreciated. All that travel, and you didn't even address anything about your parents."

"But that's what I learned from everything you showed me. They are an exception. Every single instance you showed me demonstrated that Starfleet is right, fraternization doesn't work. Just because a few people can do it doesn't mean it will be possible for everyone. The risk is high, and not everyone has the right combination of all those traits and factors that make it work. You helped me see through all my anxiety to come to that conclusion. Thank you." Yves held out a hand. Q considered, smiled, and shook it firmly.

"You're welcome. It was interesting, having you along to see it through human eyes."

"Then we both got what we wanted out of it. Could you do me one last favor?" Yves pulled an isolinear module from his padd. "It turns out I don't need it for Papa. Give this to the alternate admiral we spoke to?"

"You want to risk contaminating their timeline?"

"He has a right to hear the final product. He helped me with it. You can Q it to self destruct, I'm sure."

"I can do that." Q grinned and took the chip. 

"Thanks." Yves could sense his mother's impatience and curiosity. "I need to go. See you around."

"Most likely," Q said, tucking his hands behind his head and stretching with his feet out before him. Yves left him and ran up the path. When he looked back over the tops of the roses, Q was gone.

"A classmate?" Maman asked, apparently not sensing or seeing the same thing he was. Which disturbed him -- it contradicted what Q had claimed as his reason for appearing in the middle of the night, that Maman could sense him.

"Nope, just another student I see once in a while."

She looked sideways at him, but it was enough of a truth to pass. "What was so important, then?"

"I had to thank him for helping me with something."

She seemed about to question, but they reached another door and she let it drop. It gave him time to consider and decide that perhaps telling his parents about Q was necessary. It might help him decide how to react if Q appeared again.

But for now, he focused on the task at hand -- facing the ten fourth-year cadets that Maman greeted as they entered a smaller classroom. Somehow this was more intimidating than a crowd of fifty. Maybe it was the scowling Klingon, or the scowling Andorian. . . .

~^~^~^~^~

"Our son is spending time with Q."

Jean-Luc spun around and hit his head on the open cupboard behind him. "What?" he shouted, ducking and stalking from the kitchen to the dining area, where Deanna sat with her padds and her tea on the table before her.

"I don't believe it's your Q," she said mildly, putting down her cup. "But it's definitely a Q."

"Why didn't you tell me? You mean right now?"

"No, right now he's on his way home. Stop bellowing, or the neighbors will be arriving with cameras." She'd caught people lurking in the shrubbery a couple of times over the past few years. Despite his having a desk job with occasional diplomatic endeavors that rarely necessitated the sort of adventure he had become famous for, Jean-Luc was still a celebrity.

Jean-Luc gripped the back of a chair too hard. "Explain," he snapped.

"I've sensed this presence a few times -- in the morning some weeks ago, while Yves was home for the weekend wrestling with his ethics assignment. Then again the day of his presentation, and briefly last week, just after he left for the Academy, down the lane." Deanna sighed. "Please don't break the chair."

"Why are you so calm? This is unacceptable." But her persistent calm wore the edge off his ire, and when he pulled out the chair to sit down, his anger lost intensity. He sat, stroked his head twice, then slumped, leaving his hand splayed against the back of his head.

"He's going to be a Starfleet officer," Deanna said, balancing her chin on her hand. "How will you protect him then?"

"He should know better," Jean-Luc exclaimed, leaning forward, letting his arms fall on the table. "I told him -- I warned him not to trust Q."

"It isn't the same."

"It's always the same with Q!"

Deanna sat back, hands resting on the table before her, crossed at the wrists. Her mildly-amused expression annoyed him, as she'd expected. Sometimes it was easier to let him wrestle with his frustration until he reached a point that he might listen to reason.

"What?" he blurted at last.

"Yves has no control over Q," Deanna said. "Q could have made him vanish forever if he had chosen to -- he could have obliterated all of us, for that matter. He could have done much worse than play with us. And, you never seemed so concerned about that yourself."

"He told me he would leave our son alone."

"You even trust him to keep his word. Technically, he has left Yves alone. I told you this is not the same Q. And Yves has your good sense -- he probably realizes that there's nothing he can do to stop a Q, even if he wanted to."

"You told me you never sensed much from Q. Maybe this is someone else you've sensed."

"I sensed enough to know Q from a corporeal life form."

Jean-Luc stared at her as if he'd discovered something he'd never suspected. "He isn't corporeal when he manifests himself?"

"Not really. Your perceptions are more important to him than reality. You perceive what he wants you to, I don't. Advertising that I can sense more about him than I appear to would lead to his countering that advantage. In this case, I think it's safe to say that Yves has the situation under as much control as can be expected when dealing with a Q."

"Which means you think I shouldn't demand that he -- " Jean-Luc snorted. "But demands hardly work if Q wants to be present, do they? And all of this defensiveness and anger is unproductive and pointless."

Deanna traced the natural grain of the pale wood of the table with a fingertip idly. "It proves how much you still want to protect our son. I understand -- I wanted to say something to him long ago. But we're past the time that we can make decisions on his behalf, and he hasn't felt the need to discuss it with us, probably because he knows that you would react this way."

She watched him slumping in his chair, sensed his preoccupation and anxiety, and waited. On the periphery of her senses she could still 'hear' Yves, on his way in with something on his mind and no more anticipation than he normally felt coming from the Academy to France.

"All right," Jean-Luc said at last, sitting up and meeting her gaze. "Thank you for letting me know, finally. I wish you'd told me sooner but I understand why you waited."

"Will you confront him?"

"Yes, but not as angrily as I might have if I'd known sooner." He sniffed, shaking his head. "Somehow I think I should be upset with you for not telling me, but I can't seem to be."

"You've told me many times that you prefer to avoid losing your temper with the children."

He nodded and held out a hand. "Dee. . . ."

She left her chair, sidled around the corner of the table, slipped into the curve of his arm and settled lightly in his lap. "I like this shirt," she murmured, unbuttoning the second button and caressing his shoulder.

"I'm liking it more myself." His hands met at her hip and collaborated in keeping her firmly in his lap. "Dee, what did Q want?"

"I don't know. I don't care. Our son is at the gate and getting closer." She brushed her lips against his ear, slid her other hand beneath the shirt and over his left shoulder.

"So I shouldn't worry since Yves is fine, and -- you know, I was only reaching for your tea, since I was interrupted in making my own."

"I'm sorry, I must have misinterpreted the gesture. Would you prefer tea?" She undid the third button of his shirt and flicked it open further.

"Oh, well, I -- " Her lips grazed his cheek as he spoke; he turned into the touch and kissed her, hanging on to her thigh with one hand and sliding the other up the back of her house dress.

The front door rattled. She felt Jean-Luc flinch and broke the kiss, expecting to be dislodged, but he tightened his fingers on her leg and his traveling hand came to rest between her shoulder blades, holding her in place. He looked up into her eyes.

"Oh," Yves exclaimed, apparently having come in from the hall. "I. . . I could just go do some homework, if it's. . . ."

Deanna sat up, Jean-Luc's hand falling away. The moment had passed. She casually buttoned his shirt, knowing Yves couldn't see from where he stood. "Your father and I were just talking about Q," she said, raising her hand from the top button to caress her husband's cheek. "I'll put another kettle on for tea, Jean."

"Talking about. . . ." Yves stared, struggling to process it. "I'd hate to see what you do when you're discussing docking procedures."

"It always made senior staff meetings interesting," Jean-Luc said with characteristic dry humor, gesturing across the table. Yves took the hint and moved to sit, dropping his duffel on the floor. Deanna moved away to the stove finally; the reluctance to leave Jean-Luc's side made her wonder now about the way she'd slid into his lap. That he'd reached for her tea hadn't been unusual, as they frequently shared whatever they were drinking, and now that she thought about it, he'd said her name as if beginning a statement, not as a summons. She set the thought aside, reached for the teapot, and listened to the conversation behind her.

"Was Q here?" Yves asked.

"Not that I was aware of. You and your mother have apparently been aware of his presence, however. Would you like to tell me about it?"

There was a long pause, as Yves went through the shock and a few moments of internal debate. "There's not much to tell. He showed up on the night I decided not to do my ethics paper and asked if I wanted his help."

"Asked. . . he asked you?"

"It wasn't Q -- it was his son, Q. I really wish they would just choose names. He offered to help me. I told him I didn't want help, but then he suggested -- " Yves struggled, but in the way one did when searching for the right words, Deanna thought. "He said he could show me different possible scenarios of officers in relationships while in the same chain of command. He said he could keep us undetectable and take me to different universes and show me what might happen, and I thought it would help me understand more about what could happen, good and bad, so I could direct my research. . . ."

He must be reacting to what he sensed from his father. Deanna didn't turn from spooning loose leaf tea into the mesh basket for the large teapot.

"Did you go with him?" Jean-Luc sounded too calm. The children always knew, even before they could sense it, that this could easily be the calm before a storm.

"I should have known it wasn't the right thing to do, but at the time all I could think about was the paper. Maman said I felt too much about it. I should have realized she was right and that I wasn't slowing down to think -- but I couldn't stop imagining how many ways my doing the paper could cause trouble. And Q did help me."

Deanna put the lid on the tin of Darjeeling and smiled, resting her hands on the edge of the counter and admiring how her son had played that card. Either he had developed better intuition than she had had at his age, or Yves was thinking on his feet in spite of the anxiety of facing down his father. She put the tea tin in the cupboard Jean-Luc had left open, stared inside briefly, then silently swung the door closed.

"In what way?" Jean-Luc asked.

"Q did show me that it's nearly impossible to succeed in maintaining the professional and personal relationships the way you and Maman did. Nearly all of the scenarios I saw -- there were twenty or so of them, I lost count -- were attempts that failed, or near-misses where the timing just wasn't there."

"Who were these people you observed?" Jean-Luc was still too calm. Deanna was sure Yves could sense the ire behind these questions.

"Well, that's probably not going to surprise you -- Q showed me alternate scenarios involving you and Maman."

Deanna sensed the next response would be an outburst, and in the few seconds in which Jean-Luc wrestled with himself, she turned and said, "Did you ask him if there were any other possibilities to observe?"

Yves sat back, looking over his father's shoulder down the length of the kitchen. "He didn't offer that option. I guess I didn't feel right -- I mean, what if he'd taken me to see Tom and -- "

"Was there anything else?" Jean-Luc blurted, cutting off the thought before he could think it. "You said he could keep you from being detected -- did you?"

Yves snorted. "I know, you're going to say it's eavesdropping, but yes. I told him I wanted to see only the professional side. He mostly complied, though there was one conversation about career issues that happened in the dark. I guess technically that means I still didn't see anything. The end result was that I discovered exactly what you've told me all along, that I can't take this sort of thing for granted, it's not something everyone can do -- the kinds of obstacles you faced aren't always surmountable, even by alternate versions of yourselves. There was this one version who didn't even allow for the possibility that it could work and she -- the counselor, I mean, Counselor Troi -- she could sense something more than he wanted to admit and wouldn't work with him anymore because of it. And you, I mean he, were so determined that you -- he -- could keep his feelings from influencing their professional relationship that he wanted to convince her to work with him anyway."

Deanna finished pouring the hot water over the tea leaves and put the lid on the teapot. She hooked two more cups on her fingers and carried the pot to the table. "Do you feel he was motivated to offer her the position by the professional considerations, or by the personal? Because as much as humans want to think they know their own motivations, sometimes they aren't so rational as they would like."

Yves' chin dropped. "I hadn't really thought about that."

"What do you think?" Deanna shoved a cup across to Yves, placed another in front of Jean-Luc, and took her chair at the end of the table. "If I had announced my intent to leave the ship, would you have tried to convince me to stay based entirely on professional considerations?"

Jean-Luc scowled. Over the years, he'd lost patience with such mental exercises. "What professional considerations? You were aboard for more than a decade at that point, far longer than most officers remain in any posting if he or she has aspirations of promotion. If I had honestly responded to such a request solely from a professional standpoint, I would have had to encourage you to leave."

"The situation doesn't match," Yves said. "In the scenario the counselor was serving aboard a different vessel, under Captain Riker, and Admiral Picard was encouraging her to accept a posting on his staff. In that case it might have been an offer of advancement."

"What sort of admiral?" Deanna asked. "And, what kind of posting?"

"I don't know. I looked at his bars, but I've never seen the symbol before. A sickle and a star."

"What about the other times Q visited you?" Jean-Luc reached for the teapot.

"Those were just visits, kind of like a followup to the first one." Yves paused, glanced at Deanna, and sighed. He'd sensed the silent expectation. "I gave him something to take to the admiral in the alternate universe I just described. A copy of my speech."

"What?" Jean-Luc had been reaching to pour tea for Deanna, but set the pot down quickly midway to her cup.

"I talked to him," Yves admitted slowly. "The admiral knew Q, so he accepted who we were. He didn't talk much, but he told me enough to help me clarify for myself what I needed to do. I thought he was as entitled to hear it as anyone else who helped me."

"Yves," Deanna said sadly.

"Q came back the second time with a reply. Both times, the message was destroyed once it was heard."

Jean-Luc closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose between finger and thumb. "Dare I ask what his answer was?" he said at last, reaching the point of reluctant acceptance. All the shouting in the world wouldn't change things.

"The admiral thanked me for confirming what he'd known all along, and said that you were lucky to have managed to have a family, especially if all your children were so intelligent and sensible as me."

Jean-Luc sighed, picking up his tea. "I think that luck had very little to do with it. Your mother has better sense and more intelligence than her counterparts, and I had the presence of mind to realize how much of a fool I'd be to let her go without giving her the opportunity to exercise it."

"Yves thinks it's hehrin that our counterparts lack -- he thinks it's what made our marriage possible." Deanna smiled at his raised eyebrow. "Do you know what that means?"

"Something like respect, or admiration?"

"It holds elements of both. It's the process of seeing another person as he is and holding them in a constant state of acceptance and equality while acknowledging the negative and positive experiences and behaviors shared. In another sense, it could be seen as hope or belief -- that even though the loved one has done or said things that were ill-advised or even disrespectful or hateful, one remains convinced that the loved one will remain true to the greater good. One of Yves' classmates tried to explain it, and Yves accepted it without realizing the deeper part of it requires recognition that it is in fact impossible to attain an ongoing state of hehrin."

"But it's what I see," Yves exclaimed. "You do that all the time for each other."

Deanna smiled at her husband, probably with no less affection than he was showing as he met her eyes. "It's not what you think it is. You're trying to apply an ideal from an old Betazoid monastic sect to a relationship that has elements of it. But I understand the confusion. Your father has always maintained respect for my right to make choices, I have always tried to allow him the same freedom, and we trust each other to make those decisions that will affect our family with consideration for each other's feelings and needs. This isn't the same thing as hehrin, which is a state that those Betazoid monks believed could only happen after a lifetime of meditation."

"Oh." Yves shrugged away the embarrassment. "Guess that was a little optimistic of me."

"Well, yes, considering your father's never been able to meditate for more than half an hour without falling asleep."

"Bad Betazoid," Jean-Luc exclaimed, tapping her leg with his toe under the table.

"You can spank me later." Deanna smiled serenely at him and sipped hot tea. Glancing at Yves, she raised an eyebrow. "Is something wrong?"

"I'm trying to figure out whether I should go back to the Academy and give you two some privacy." His eyes shifted from her to his father and back.

"I think I must be reacting to you," she said, turning to Jean-Luc. "I expected you to be furious beyond reason when I told you about Q. Knowing how paternal you can be and how that can override your judgment, I thought you would take longer to be rational about things."

"I must be getting old. Losing my edge." Jean-Luc couldn't seem to look at either her or Yves, adopting instead a contemplative expression.

"Plus, you were deliberately trying to provoke me by leaving your top button undone."

He blinked, was momentarily at a loss, and then ran his hand over his scalp. "I did mention her intelligence, didn't I? And her good taste."

"I think you did," Yves replied. "I can leave, if you want."

"You might like to let your siblings know we'll be busy for about twelve hours. That will allow you to reschedule whatever you had planned for tonight to tomorrow night." Deanna smiled at her son's dismayed reaction.

"It's impossible to surprise you, Maman. All right, see you tomorrow."

After the front door shut, she addressed her husband's resigned frustration. "Happy anniversary."

"You really can't be surprised, can you?" Sometime in the past seventeen years, he had taken up the challenge to surprise her, if he could.

"It was a convincing charade of forgetfulness, but you left my gift in that open cupboard when you came roaring over here when I mentioned Q. Would you like to know what I have for you?"

"That depends. Are you going to tell me, or show me?"

~^~^~^~^~^~

Picard turned from the fireplace to look at the broad windows, in which the lights of the city shimmered. This condominium across the bay from the Academy was in an area reserved for the elite of Starfleet, and consequently only rarely was there any disturbance of the peace. At night, he could hear the waves along the shore, though his unit was half a kilometer away.

The module that had contained the boy's presentation had long since disintegrated, immediately after he'd listened to it four weeks ago. He hadn't wanted to hear more of the boy's nonchalant acceptance of his parents' relationship. It surprised him when he played it and heard the confident voice, similar to his own, calmly espousing caution and abstinence from whatever temptation might lure an officer to fraternization.

He remembered also the things the boy had said. She gave you a chance. You can't respond to her with the same level of emotion. That's what she was looking for.

Had Yves been right?

Why was he still mulling over this, if he honestly believed what he had told Yves?

She would have gone with you four years ago, you could have talked her into it today.

He sniffed, flinching, almost spilling his wine. Crossing the living room, he set the glass on a table and waved his hand over the lamp to turn it on. The single low-power bulb against the darkness outside cast a feeble pool of yellow in the window, and his reflection faded at his ear, giving him the appearance of walking out of blackness.

He stared at his own scowl and heard the echoes again. She gave you exactly what you would expect today.

What he would have expected was honesty -- she had given that. He had not expected her to do as he asked; he had only wanted confirmation that she hadn't changed her mind. She not only confirmed it, but more explicitly than before. It had been her first acknowledgement of her feelings in six years. The boy couldn't know about the past.

Yet, after the boy's visit, so full of nuances that teased his curiosity and made him wish he could see him again. . . . The boy was, in a way, her son. From another reality but still -- still, the boy had shown insight that rang true, and if there weren't a marked similarity between his mother and the counselor, how could that be? The boy had reminded him so much of Deanna that he couldn't help going over and over that last conversation with her, trying to understand the nuances of what she'd said, drawing on the boy's observations.

You were willing to work with the counselor, knowing that she knows how you feel about her, and you expected her to consider it.

Where would this conversation have gone if he had actually listened to the boy? Would Picard have understood that statement fully? The insinuation seemed to be that Yves thought the counselor's refusal to work with him was understandable, so basic that it needed no further explanation -- or perhaps he would have explained, given the opportunity.

He could feel the cold from the window, in spite of the engineering that had gone into the transaluminum to mitigate heat leakage. The quiet seemed overwhelming, suddenly, but he knew that the feeling would pass and waited for that.

We call her Maman. We learned French along with Standard and Betazoid. Papa felt it was only fair.

"It's only fair," he murmured, thinking about that critical moment four years before. He had gone to Ten Forward looking for her, to voice his feelings in spite of everything, and had found her there in the company of Will Riker, and about a dozen cheering crew members. Beverly had seen him and hurried over to tell him that a proposal had been accepted. How he had managed to stumble through the following moments without arousing suspicion, he had no idea. Fortunately most of the focus was on the beaming couple.

At some point, Deanna's eyes met his, and her smile waned. He knew then that she sensed how this impacted him, how difficult, how devastating it was. She had slipped away from Riker and come to face him, actually drawing him away from the crowd as Will described the wedding ceremony on Betazed. She had asked him softly if he would officiate in a ceremony for the crew, before they took leave. She had looked in his eyes, waiting, his hand in both of hers.

How many times had she looked at him like that in the weeks leading up to Will's proposal? He recalled a few incidents when she had hesitated in leaving his ready room, or had looked at him seriously as they were at their posts on the bridge. Was he reading anything into those looks now?

Had she drawn him away from the others because she wanted to give him the opportunity to speak anyway?

I would have accepted it four years ago.

It isn't too late, logistically speaking. He might even forgive me in time.

Troi had tossed off those comments so casually that the words had failed to register until later -- until after Yves had come and gone. The boy might have been correct. She might have been offering an opportunity, couched in the responses that she knew Picard would expect to hear. And Yves, son of another Troi in another universe, had also thrown out startling comments in such an offhanded manner that they'd passed unnoticed.

I wonder if she doubted you would be so resolute.

Picard noticed by his reflection that his frown had deepened. Perhaps his resolution was as uncertain as Yves obliquely suggested. Why continue to muse over this issue if the matter had been decided?

He was certain that Troi needed to stay where she was, and he needed to move on.

Or was he? She had sounded convinced of it. Why this long internal debate tonight?

He shook it off and moved away from the window, away from the cold, settling in his favorite chair on the other side of the table to read. As he reached for the book waiting alongside his wine glass, he realized he still felt the cold.

"Computer, temperature."

"Seventy-eight degrees Fahrenheit."

That seemed right. Sighing, he opened the hardback to his bookmark and turned his thoughts to Plato.

An hour later, a single tone sounded, echoing through the house. He closed the book and set it aside. Tugging at his collar, then his jacket, he rose and strode toward the den, snapping the order to drop the shutters over the windows. This would be his next assignment. He secured the door behind him, sat at the console, and waited for the retinal and DNA scans required by Section 31 regulations.

The text remained only for a few moments before the screen went black. The mission would take him far into the Beta Quadrant. As he always did when sent into the Empire, he glanced up at the picture of his former wife, now deceased after serving the Federation as a covert agent infiltrating the Romulan government, and wished he hadn't been forced to kill her. If only she hadn't suffered that crisis of conscience and tried to disable the device they'd been sent to install in the Praetor's private rooms.

If only Deanna weren't so unfailingly honest and ethical. He had known the day that she came to him, six and a half years ago, that she could never be trusted with the knowledge of his status with the Section -- that she had announced the termination of their therapist-client relationship based on her feelings for him had been a clear sign. It would only have worked if he could tell her everything; it would have been impossible to explain his sudden absences and lengthy missions to an empath who knew truth from lie.

But this was his assumption. He had been tempted by another thought -- she may have been aware of his status, may have been waiting for him to speak. Perhaps the show of ethical behavior hadn't been motivated by the ethics, but merely her way of getting his attention. Framing her confession with professionalism may have been easier than a simple statement of feelings.

All these years he had wavered, waiting for a sign that either assumption might be correct. The possibility, however remote, had kept him wondering and tentatively approaching her, offering the Starfleet posting, waiting for proof that she knew. Then Yves had come along and he had been forced to articulate what he had always known to be true, and the boy's presentation had reinforced it -- there were precious few who could manage such a balancing act.

And yet, Yves had also made him question this assumption that it would not work. Picard imagined telling her everything, being accepted, watching her tear apart her marriage and leave her son behind -- children were unsophisticated and unable to keep secrets; the boy would have to stay with his father. And that would never happen. Deanna Troi would never leave her child. She had said as much -- reality was what it was. She accepted her circumstances and wouldn't change her mind. His life was such that encumbrances such as children and lovers were likely to become liabilities and weaknesses. Section disciplinary tactics were not normally a concern for him, but might become more likely were he to attempt having a family; it was easier to be gone most of the time when he had only a computer to come home to.

No, it really was best not to mix duty and love.


End file.
